Economy
WORK IN PROGRESS SotS2, allows the player to take a more active part of managing the financial state of the empire than what was possible in SotS1. Through a series of sliders on the Empire Manager that can be accessed by clicking the pie chart on the top left corner of the main screen, the player can control the amount of credits that are going to the different departments of the Empire's Budget. Politics Here the player can see what effect his actions are taking and observe the type of government his empire will become. There is a red crosshair that moves according to the decisions made in the game Tax Rate This slider controls the rate at which the empire collects taxesfrom it's citizens. Though it can be helpful to raise this level in times of need, it must be done carefully, if raised too high for too long it affects morale in the empire. Immigration Rate To do later. Empire Manager Through a series of sliders in the Empire Manager screen (accessed by clicking the pie chart on the top left corner of the main screen) the player can control the amount of credits that are going to the different departments of the Empire's Budget. 'Security' In the security section there are three sliders: #Operations #Intel #Counter Intel At the moment, there isn't much information regarding the exact effects of this section. One can only speculate that it must have some sort of impact on the success of Espionage Missions and in fighting Espionage Missions from another empire. One thing known to be affected by this is the level of corruption. 'Stimulus' Here the player defines the amount of monetary support that his government will provide to the civilian population to start their own business or colony. It's divided in three sliders: #Mining #Colonization #Trade The top advantage of this system is that it doesn't require the player to worry about placing stations, colonizing new planets or building freighters to trade. But it does require that some money is invested and that your civilians are protected, because if any freighter or station is destroyed by an enemy morale will suffer. More info: http://www.kerberos-productions.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=23390 'Research' Here the player can control how much money is allocated to each section of research. Now we have three types of research available, regular research, special projects and salvage research. #Special Project #Salvage Research 'Expenses' Building an empire is an expensive thing. Everything costs money, be it colonizing a new world, sustaining that shiny new fleet or even grease the hands of some officials to look the other way... Under colony development goes all the expenditure on making a new planet habitable, until it starts making money by itself. Next goes the total upkeep for the fleets and stations. The corruption value represents how much money the empire is losing because of some shady characters that are diverting money from, for example the research budget. This value can be countered by increasing the amount that goes into security. Just slide the bar in the security section until the value of corruption reaches zero, this change is automatic and doesn't need the passing of a turn to take effect. Finally, the debt interest. This is the amount of credits that the empire is paying for being in debt, it's important to avoid this because if left unattended it can ruin the empire. Notes You will notice that when the player reduces the research budget, the surplus no longer goes to the treasury as opposed to what happened in SotS Prime. Now that surplus goes to the government - Security and Stimulus - so to counter that effect, every time the budget is changed it's mandatory to go to the Empire Manager and adjust the Savings This Turn Slider. This way, those credits go to the treasury.